Air pollution from California wildfires in 2017 and 2018 spiked so high and so rapidly that air quality models couldn’t keep up. That poses a problem for state officials charged with keeping the public informed about air quality. Read Full Article »

The next battle over federal spending is set to erupt almost as soon as Congress completes its seven-bill omnibus package, with lawmakers pushing for more money to help their states recover from hurricanes, wildfires, and other disasters. Read Full Article »

Wisconsin’s new governor, declaring 2019 the “year of clean drinking water,” wants to spend $75 million to clean up the state’s water supplies, long considered its environmental weak spot. Read Full Article »

The Senate passed a combined conservation and public lands package Feb. 12 that would revive the expired Land and Water Conservation Fund and prevent the kind of funding lapses that since the fall have put efforts to add to wildlife refuges, national parks, and local biking and hiking trails on hold. Read Full Article »

Gov. Asa Hutchinson (R) and Arkansas legislators issued a proposed two-part $300 million long-term highway funding plan on Feb. 11; a plan they said would represent the largest in Arkansas’s history. Read Full Article »

In his inaugural “State of the State” address on Feb. 12, Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) announced the state was pulling back on the scale and scope of California’s high-speed train program – abandoning plans, at least for now, to build high-speed rail routes along the coast to focus instead on finishing the already-being-built line in the state’s Central Valley. Read Full Article »

Congress is poised to vote on spending legislation that would provide $86.5 billion for transportation projects, including a $10 million down payment for a high speed, magnetic levitation train between D.C. and Baltimore that could eventually extend to New York City. Read Full Article »